Finding a New Nickname
by smileatthemonsters
Summary: When a routine hunt goes wrong and Clarke is left piecing a young hunter back together, she encounters more than she bargained for. [Bellarke], a slow burn.
1. Doc

"SOMEBODY FIND CLARKE."

Inside the dropship, Clarke's head snapped up and she dropped the wad of ripped cloth she'd been fashioning into bandages, her feet propelling her towards the door even as her brain began to register what was happening. Miller's voice. He was on hunting detail today. Hunting injury? He was shouting for her from the gate - most hunting-sustained injuries are brought to her in the ship, as they usually consisted of sprains, twists, bruises, and breaks. This was something worse, then. Something life-threatening.

Clarke's feet had done their part during her mental triage, and she screeched to a halt in front of Miller. "Who is it?" She demanded, noting that Miller's hands were empty save the ever-present rifle.

"Jeremy." He replied grimly, stepping aside to reveal Munroe and Sterling supporting the smaller boy between them, one arm slung over each of their shoulders. His skin was white as a sheet under the caked on grime that had become part of their uniform, and his chin was dropped forward to his chest, so that Clarke was faced with the top of his head. Unconscious. His toes dragged on the ground, as he was distinctly smaller than his two human crutches, and his hands barely reached their opposite shoulders. Clarke's lips pursed. Jeremy was one of their younger campers, clocking in at a fresh-faced 13 (and three quarters, as he was fond of reminding them).

"Get him to the dropship. Onto the table." Clarke ordered the two older hunters, who immediately complied, Miller and Clarke following shortly behind. "What happened?"

"Grounder trap," Miller's voice was grim, "A panther chased a buck right past us. Jer speared it and ran ahead to get it. Wasn't looking where he was going, sprung the trap. Those came flying out of a hollow tree." Clarke looked to where he indicated, and noted two large chunks of jagged wood impaled into Jeremy's back. One was at the top of his right shoulder, and the other just a few inches below it, closer to his side.

"He's lucky," Clarke mused as they reached the ship and ran inside, "It looks like they might have missed anything vital."

"About four of those flew over his shoulder." Miller added, following Clarke into the makeshift sick bay where Munroe and Sterling had laid Jeremy down on his stomach atop the metal table. "It was designed to catch something a lot taller than him."

"Tell him that next time he complains about the rations being strung up so high." Clarke joked, but her voice was strained. It wasn't looking likely that anyone would be telling Jeremy anything in the foreseeable future. "Munroe, grab me bandages and the suture kit, and my big knife. Sterling, get water and some of Monty's latest batch, and make sure there's a fire going somewhere." Clarke began to examine Jeremy's shoulder as they scrambled off. Miller hovered by the door, waiting for her initial scan to complete. "Miller," She spoke without looking up, leaning down to smell the wood, searching for any indication it may have been poisoned, "Grab a team and go bring in that deer before the panther gets it. See if you can figure out how the trap was sprung, and how we can recognize them in the future."

"Sure thing." Miller nodded, and headed for the door. Clarke glanced up from her examinations, her voice halting him as he reached the parachute-tarped entryway.

"And Miller?" She called, "Be careful. I haven't got any more free tables."

"Yes, ma'am." Miller spun, offering a mock salute as he backed down the ramp and out of sight. Clarke sighed, returning her attention to the boy in front of her. Munroe was the first to return, slipping in just as Clarke wrapped her fingers around the first chunk of wood.

"Perfect timing. Come over here and hold him down, I need to wrench these out and it will probably wake him up." Clarke instructed. The taller girl rushed over, dropping her cargo on the supply table and placing her bloodied hands on the left side of Jeremy's back. Clarke ground her teeth together as she pulled the first branch out, hissing in frustration as pieces of it splintered. "That's good," She murmured, "Maybe if the branch had been poisoned, the added agent would have smoothed it out and prevented this kind of breakage." Munroe's furrowed glance reminded Clarke that this was dramatically optimistic, but Clarke choose to ignore it for the moment and focus on the task at hand. She fished out as much of the splinters as she could, splashing the water from her own canteen into the wound and rolling the still unconscious boy over to flush out the wound. Clarke had just pulled the second branch out when Sterling sprinted back in. "Moonshine." Clarke instructed.

Sterling darted to the table and unstoppered the large bottle, dumping it over the two wounds before splashing it on Munroe and Clarke's outstretched hands, followed by his own. The three sanitized in silence. Clarke had required that most of the hunters and gunners come in for a crash course in emergency medical care, as they were usually the ones on hand when it was required. She was grateful for that now, as despite their nervous eyes and clenched jaws, the two hunters were proving to be steady and reliable help. They now held Jeremy down as Clarke began to stitch him up, exchanging worried glances as the minutes ticked by. Still, their charge lay motionless on the table - so much so that Clarke stopped to check his pulse multiple times, convinced twice she'd lost him before rediscovering his admirably persistent thumping heart.

It wasn't until she was finishing up the second wound that he finally awoke with a raspy scream, jerking back and forth under Munroe and Sterling's gentle pressure. "Done!" Clarke gasped at last, stepping back and watching the younger boy fall still, his back heaving with the effort of bringing in air.

"Good job, Doc." Munroe murmured. Her face remained stony, a trait that many of the gunners had begun to share as the reality of their new charge sunk in, but there was a hint of admiration in her eyes that warmed Clarke's heart. Inside the walls of her hospital, she had earned a new nickname, one that sat much better with her than "Princess." No one would own up to using it outside of the dropship, and certainly no one would dare let it slip in front of their fearsome leader, but having it here was more than enough.

"Thank you. Both. You were a huge help. Go get dinner before it's all snatched up." Clarke ushered the two hunters out of the dropship and into the waning daylight. She turned to Jeremy, whose eyes were starting to droop. "Here, Jer, drink this." She helped him sit up at the edge of the table, and held her canteen up to his lips, spilling the lukewarm water down his throat. He drank messily, his knuckles white as he gripped the neck of the bottle, but enough of the liquid found its way inside of him to satisfy Clarke. A bit of color had found its way back onto his cheeks, and his eyes were beginning to look less wild than they had when he'd first awoke.

"What happened?" He croaked, reaching across his chest in an attempt to feel what was causing the pulsating pain eminating from his right shoulder. Clarke swatted his hand away, forcing a kind smile onto her face despite the worry that crept into her stomach at how his hand was still shaking.

"You stole a deer from a panther." She answered, watching the gears turn behind his eyes as he attempted to piece together what she meant.

"I got in a fight with a panther?" He finally asked, confusion evident on his face, which was gaining color by the minute.

"You got in a fight with a tree." A deeper voice sounded from the door of the ship, and Clarke turned, only somewhat surprised by Bellamy's appearance. He made it a point to keep track of the status of his hunters, and would often drop in on their check-ups with Clarke to see to it that she had the back in fighting shape as quickly as possible. Bellamy stepped past the tarp, and Clarke noted that he was carrying three sticks, each spearing a hefty chunk of browned meat. "Thought you two might be hungry." He arrived at the side of the table, distributing their dinners before leaning back onto the nearby supply table.

"Thanks!" Jeremy enthused, ripping into his share before freezing, his cheeks bulging with food. His eyes widened a little as he glanced from Bellamy to his kabob and back. He began to speak, looking as though he might swallow that first bite whole, but Clarke's murderous gaze forced the younger boy to indulge in diligent chewing for a few moments before speaking again. When finally his mouth was clear, his words spilled out, tumbling one over the other. "Did I kill this?" Bellamy nodded, a smile dancing around his lips. "And took it from a panther?" Bellamy nodded again, and a smile of her own began to creep onto Clarke's face. "And then a tree attacked me?" Here, a little of the air deflated from Jeremy's puffed up chest, and confusion creased his face again. Clarke's smile faded, and she glanced at the ground before answering.

"You sprang a grounders' trap," Bellamy's voice was smooth and careful, gentle insistence hidden behind clinical fact, answering so Clarke didn't have to, "And it speared you twice in the back." The color that had been gradually finding its way back to Jeremy's cheeks fled once more as his gaze darted fervently to his right shoulder. Clarke's heart dropped into her stomach at the sight. "So," Bellamy speaking again brought both of their attentions back up from the floor, "Not only did you feed the entire camp tonight, but you martyred yourself to identify a new threat. Thanks to you springing it, Miller determined how we can recognize traps like that, so no one else gets hurt. You're a hero tonight, Jeremy, and the whole camp knows it. Thank you." Bellamy clapped his hand on Jeremy's left shoulder, engulfing it under freckled knuckles, and Jeremy's face lit up like it was Unity Day on the Ark.

"Do you mean it?" He gasped, and Bellamy nodded, his face all pride and comfort and warmth. Jeremy surged forward, throwing his arms around Bellamy's waist in what surely was in his mind the appropriate response to being called a hero. Clarke chuckled the immediate discomfort evident on Bellamy's face, but noted that it didn't infect his hands, which respectively squeezed Jeremy's left shoulder and ruffled his hair.

"Now head over to your cot, buddy. You're spending the night in here." Bellamy instructed. Policy, with grounder related injuries, given the increasing likelihood that the weapon was poisoned. Clarke, too, would be spending the night in the dropship, monitoring the young hunter for any signs of poison or infection and hopefully catching them early enough to be helpful. Jeremy stood, wavering for a moment before walking over to the mattress in the corner, asleep even as his cheek hit the blanket beneath him. Clarke trailed after him, spreading neon orange blanket over him and tucking in the edges before drifting back to the table, where Bellamy was still working on his dinner.

"He really looks up to you." Clarke offered when she reached him, her voice hushed as to not wake their young patient, "Thank you, for saying all that. He needed to hear it, from you." Bellamy shrugged, his impassive mask securely back in place now that Jeremy was asleep.

"Eat your dinner, Princess, before a panther comes and takes it away from you." Bellamy's voice was taunting and gravelly, the smooth sincerity that he'd offered to Jeremy long gone now. "I'll come by later, I want to talk strategy with you. We're gonna lose serious time if our hunters have to walk on eggshells in those woods every time they step foot outside our wall."

"You know where to find me." Clarke answered, ripping off a piece of deer and wrinkling her nose. It was severely overcooked and tasted like ash, but after the passionate lecture she'd given about the dangers of undercooked meat, with a pallid and violently vomiting Marcus on the ground behind her to underscore the whole speech, most of their meat was well, well done. Bellamy disappeared through the parachute, and Clarke returned to the almost-made bandages she'd abandoned at the top of the evening.


	2. Mom

Darkness hung heavy and silent over the camp. Flickering firelight cast dancing shadows against the imposing walls, sending shivers down the spines of the guards who bravely endured, prioritizing the company of the eerie shadows over the terror that the unlit night would bring. The wind rustled the dying leaves, branches occasionally scratching against the roof of the dropship, and the calls of creatures lurking just beyond the walls echoed against the metallic surface of the ship.

Clarke lay awake, staring at the ceiling above her. All these sounds warred around her, and yet it felt quiet. The insistent hum of the Ark had been a constant presence she, along with the rest of the hundred, had taken for granted. Now, despite the omnipresent sounds of the forest, Earth felt stifling in its silence, and she found that she couldn't sleep. Raven was fashioning a generator for the dropship, to provide some heat source and to recharge the flashlights that Clarke feared would soon run out of juice. Clarke hoped that this, perhaps, would offer some kind of surrogate hum - she knew that many of her companions pined for it as well.

A new sound shattered the silence that lay heavy around her, piercing through the blackness and sending her sitting up with a start. It was soft and at first foreign to her ear, but as she listened closer, she was able to identify it: the heavy, sharp-edged breathing that warned of sobs to come. Clarke stepped out of the blanket-strewn chair she was using as a bed, tiptoeing across the room to where Jeremy was cocooned on the med-bay cot. He was curled into himself, facing the wall, and his shoulders were shaking. Leaning over, Clarke confirmed that his eyes were squeezed shut, glistening tears creeping out from underneath his lashes as his eyes darted about beneath their lids. He was dreaming. The edge of his breathing was beginning to take on a low pitch, his gasps becoming groans, and his lips turned downwards as he cried out suddenly, and loudly.

"Jeremy!" Clarke whispered, putting one hand gently on his hip, avoiding the bandaged shoulder facing her. "Jeremy, it's okay. You're dreaming." He had begun to toss and turn, and Clarke cursed under her breath, imagining the damage he could cause his stitches in the process. When he rolled closer to the wall, Clarke took the opportunity to sit on the edge of the cot next to his head, and when he jerked upwards suddenly, she slid back to rest her own back against the wall, catching Jeremy's head and bringing it to rest on her lap. She ran her fingers through his hair and along his neck, humming softly on a monotone in hopes that the reminder of the Ark's soft song would calm him down. Sure enough, he began to settle, and as he grew more still, Clarke added a tune to her hum - not the lullaby she'd sung to the dying boy in the woods, but a lighter tune that she recalled from her preschool days, lilting and hopeful.

Jeremy finally settled, his breathing evening and the creases on his too-young face smoothing out. A serenity fell over him then, and Clarke breathed out a sigh of relief. She let gravity take control then, her head tilting backwards until it met with the cool metal of the ship wall. The pull of the earth seemed to extend then to her eyes as her lashes fluttered down to meet her cheeks, and she watched the stars dance on the back of her own eyelids. She'd almost succumbed to the tempting grasps of sleep, lulled by the steady rhythm of Jeremy's breathing and the warmth his occupation on her lap provided, when he shifted in his sleep and spoke. His whispers drifted up, sneaking their way into her ears and past her defenses, piercing their way straight into her heart and wrapping around it in a vice grip. Two simple words:

"Thanks, Mom."

Just as her heart had constricted, now too did Clarke's throat take it upon itself to clench tightly closed, a watery sob trapped inside, and tears fell unbidden on her flaming cheeks. No. Could she have misheard him? One glance down at the serene peace painting Jeremy's face dashed her hopes away - her ears had not been mistaken. Her hand, which had been gently massaging the back of her young companion's neck, now floated upwards and found a new home clasped over her trembling lips, to prevent any errant sounds of her own from escaping.

A rustle of movement from by her cot sent goosebumps prickling along her arms, and Clarke stiffened, the hand pressing against her mouth now repurposed to mask the sound of her own, still erratic breathing. There shouldn't be anyone else in med-bay at this hour... should there? If someone was hurt, they would have announced themselves. Her mind was racing and, with the adrenaline pumping energy and fear through her system, she was finding it difficult to remember whether she was expecting anyone. With her other hand, Clarke reached over to the nearby table, closing her fingers around the flashlight she'd left there for Jeremy in case he awoke in the night. She took a steadying breath, then swung the light to face forward, flipping the switch as she hit her mark. A rectangle of light splayed forward and bounced back a snapshot image of the intruder, and Clarke released the breath she'd been holding with a haughty huff.

Bellamy. She had, in her moment of panic, forgotten his plan to return, and she felt her stomach flip in momentary embarrassment at the fear his arrival had instilled in her. He now stood in the pool of light, one hand lifted to shield his eyes, a grimace twisting his mouth downward. "Hey, watch it there Princess." He hissed, shifting to escape the glares of both Clarke and the flashlight. She switched it off, and looked down, eyebrows knitting together. How would she move without waking Jeremy?

The smell of smoke and the forest washed over her and announced Bellamy's arrival at the cot, and she felt his fingers brush her knee - he was kneeling. The flashlight had forcibly readjusted her eyes, and in its absence now she found herself suddenly blind and cursing herself for her impulsive reaction. Something else, folded and soft, pressed against her lap, and she realized Bellamy had brought over the blanket from her chair across the room. Clever boy. She slid one hand gently under Jeremy's head, the other meeting Bellamy's at her knee to let him know they were on the same page. In one fluid motion, Clarke slipped out from under the sleeping boy and Bellamy propelled the folded blanket to catch his head. Jeremy stirred for a moment, and both leaders froze until he settled once more.

"Grabbed your coat." Bellamy whispered, his hand floating out to rest on Clarke's back to locate her in the darkness, its match following in suit to drape over her shoulders the jacket that had previously been taking up residence on the back of her chair. She slid her arms into the arms as they moved to the door, the colder air of the camp making her grateful for the extra protection and prompting a 'hmm' of thanks to her partner for thinking of retrieving it. Once clear of the parachute tarp, Bellamy stopped, sitting on the ramp and stretching out his legs. Clarke dropped to sit next to him, more able to see now that the flickering torches of the night watch were reaching them. A coppery smell reached her nose suddenly and unbidden, and she gagged.

"Are you bleeding?" She asked, her voice heavy with the accusation. Bellamy scoffed, shaking his head.

"Of course not." He shot back. Clarke frowned. Was she bleeding? A quick self-inventory confirmed that she was not, and yet the stench remained, every intake of breath refreshing its pungent presence in the front of her mind. Another soft sound of disgust escaped her, and Bellamy glanced over, his eyes narrowing a bit. "Uh... _Is _that your jacket?" He asked. Clarke looked down, and her frown deepened.

"Oh, no, it's not. Whose..." The color drained from her face, and she suddenly ripped the coat off, holding it up in front of her. The back was slashed open and crusty with dried blood - it was the jacket Jeremy had been wearing on the hunt. Miller must have brought it back and left it draped on the chair, and in her exhaustion, Clarke hadn't noticed how poorly it fit her. Bellamy snickered, and Clarke shoved the offending jacket into his lap before brushing desperately at her shoulders, as if that would remove the smell that still clung to her.

"Sorry." Bellamy smirked, not sounding apologetic in the slightest, and Clarke rolled her eyes, curling now to bring her knees to her chest in an attempt to replace the warmth she'd lost at the removal of Jeremy's jacket. Bellamy's gaze swept her now bare arms, taking stock of her discomfort, but if he worried that she was cold, he did nothing about it. "Miller's got ideas about those traps." Clarke's mind raced to catch up - traps. Miller. Grounders. Jeremy. _Jeremy_. Clarke squeezed her eyes closed, giving her head a small shake to clear thoughts of what had just transpired inside the dropship from clouding her judgment. There would be time for that later. For now - traps. Miller. Grounders.

"How long will it take?" Clarke asked. Bellamy frowned for a moment, her momentary lapse not lost on him, but he too seemed to shake it off.

"He can sweep the woods a half-mile out surrounding the camp with a team of three in a day. Training another team to disarm would take as long as doing it themselves." He anticipated Clarke's question before she had even begun to ask it, and she nodded, lips pressed together. It was moments like these that she considered how lucky they'd been, that the egotistical boy who'd decided to seize control of their ragtag camp was, beneath his rough edges and smirking, a capable and level-headed leader.

"Okay." Clarke agreed. Bellamy paused a moment, then pressed on.

"I'm going to pull three of the gunners off the wall tomorrow and send them hunting. With Miller disarming so close to camp, he can warn us just as easily of a Grounder attack." A note of finality in his voice affirmed Clarke's assumption that this was all he'd come to report, and she nodded again.

"Okay." She echoed her previous assertion, and let the lull in conversation live for a moment. Bellamy didn't move, in fact settling back on his elbows and tilting his gaze upwards to where the clouds had begun to clear to reveal twinkling stars through the overhang of the trees. "Why wake me up to discuss something you sound like you've already figured out?"

"I didn't wake you up." Bellamy's answer was softer, deeper than before, his gaze never leaving the sky above them. He had shed his air of business, and Clarke was struck with the notion that she was no longer speaking to the leader of a hundred - eighty-two - delinquent teenagers.

"No, you didn't." She agreed, letting the guard slide out of her own voice to meet the gentle rapport he'd offered in his tone. She let her chin rest on her shoulder, watching Bellamy watch the stars until, after a pregnant pause, his gaze flickered to meet hers. There was an accusation in it, a gentle probing statement that made Clarke draw her lips inwards, feeling the dimples on her cheeks tighten. "You heard what Jeremy said." Her accusation met his in the space between them, and his expression softened, that alone proving her right.

"Get some sleep, Princess." An instruction. Clarke was too tired to argue, and nodded slightly, pushing herself to her feet and heading back for the dropship. Bellamy's hand shot out and caught hers as he rose as well, placing himself between her and the door. His hand slid out of hers, and he caught hold of both her shoulders, holding her at arm's length in front of him. "Not here," He clarified, beginning to propel her back down the ramp towards camp, "You haven't spent a night in your tent in a week, and I know you aren't sleeping when you're in med-bay. I'll watch Jeremy tonight."

"No, I'm fine." Clarke protested, moving to push past him and back into the ship, but Bellamy would hear none of it, easily holding her in place.

"Go. Sleep. You earned it." An order, tucked behind.. a compliment? Clarke met his gaze, defiant and with every intention of arguing, but Bellamy's expression silenced her. He was a leader in full form, his smirk gone and replaced with a firm resolve. There was no convincing him, and if she was honest with herself, the prospect of finishing the night out in her own bed was the most appealing thought she'd had in days. Bellamy seemed to recognize her acceptance, because his vice grip on her shoulders loosened, and his hands dropped back to his sides.

"Goodnight." Clarke finally conceded, stepping backwards off of the metal of the ramp and turning to move towards her tent, rubbing her arms to replace the warmth his hands had taken with them. Reaching the flap of her tent, she cast a glance over her shoulder - Bellamy mirrored her at the entrance to the dropship. Although too dark to tell, she imagined that their eyes met, and she understood that he was waiting to make sure she was truly headed to sleep. Fair. It had occurred to her more than once on her minute-long walk to her tent that Bellamy would be helpless if Jeremy's stitches split in the night. His presence at the dropship door confirmed, however, that were she to attempt to return to med-bay, she would not be allowed to reenter. The finality of that silent declaration washed over her, the comfort of her lack of choice helping her to turn and retreat into her own tent, asleep almost as her cheek met her pillow, her thoughts mercifully devoid of anything but the heavy slumber that accompanies the desperate need for rest.


	3. Speedy

**Hey team. Sorry I haven't actually said anything, as me, yet. Hello! Thanks so much for your support and your reviews. They mean the world to me! I know this is a slooooooow burn - in action and in romance. I really want to take it kinda slow and set the world up the way it makes sense to me, but please PLEASE don't hesitate to say if you feel like it's dragging! Your opinion matters so much!**

**I suppose I should have said this by now, but none of this belongs to me. **

—

The lake stretched out in front of Clarke, the water rippling slightly as the wind pulled it to and fro, its edge lapping at her bare feet. She dug her toes into the soft sand, letting her head fall back and feeling the air fill her lungs. A flush crept into her cheeks as a breeze of crisp wind blew over her, tossing her blonde hair around her face and adhering it to the sweat that dripped there. The sharp call of a bird pulled Clarke from her reverie and and she let a long sigh escape her lips.

She leaned down, quickly banishing whatever resilient grains of sand still clung to her skin pulling her socks and shoes back over her feet. Still bent at the waist, she flipped her hair over and recaptured it into a ponytail, straightening up to let its damp ends tickle the back of her neck. Clarke took one swig from her newly filled water canteen before reattaching it to her belt and taking off once more.

She'd started running regularly about a week ago, after one of their hunters had fallen into a grounder trap and snapped his ankle about a mile out of camp. It had been frustrating and heartbreaking to need to take time to catch her breath when she'd gotten there. The looks of disdain from her guards had been rivaled only by the sounds of pain and despair coming from the fallen boy. Clarke was determined not to be at the mercy of her own body any more than she could help - there were certainly enough things here on the ground that had her at their mercies.

Time on Earth seemed to operate under its own rules, and a week in to her new schedule, Clarke could already feel the change cementing into her body. She felt stronger, her lungs seemed more capable of pumping oxygen, and she carried herself more confidently. How her body could acclimate so quickly was a mystery to her, one that she was at present pondering as her feet guided her over the rocky terrain away from the lake back into the woods. Adrenaline was the most likely culprit, her own body instinctively bulking up and doing what it must in order to survive. Still, it was incredible, the relationship between the body and the mind! She'd seen it again and again on Earth - the sheer power of will healing their hunters in record time, the drive to live allowing feats of strength and endurance she imagined the scientists above them would drool over for weeks, were their wristbands still operational. Maybe they could harness that power, turn it into -

Black. White. Stars? _Ouch_. Clarke found herself staring at the bright blue sky above her, its dappled light falling through the foliage and warming her face. No, that wasn't right. The sun wasn't warming her face. It was too early for that. Why was her face… hurting. Her face hurt. Clarke squeezed her eyes closed, and hissed at the immediate pain that brought. Sitting up slowly and opening her eyes, painfully aware of the darkness dancing around the edges of her vision, Clarke identified her current location as: flat on her ass on the leaf-strewn forest floor, about two feet below a low hanging branch.

"Fuck." Clarke whispered, pulling herself on to her feet as the stars dancing around her head cleared - when she was standing straight, she found herself eye-level with that same branch. She'd run into the damn thing, so lost in her thoughts about… wrists? Clarke gave herself a quick shake, navigating around her inanimate attacker, and took a long sip from her water. Her forehead was tender, and she could already feel gravity pulling her blood downward. She'd have quite the raccoon mask to explain upon her return to camp. Finally feeling steady on her feet, Clarke began to jog once again, much lighter than before and taking careful note of her less-than familiar surroundings. She'd come farther into the woods than she'd thought, so caught up in her body's new capabilities and the implications therein. A few moments later, she broke through the tree cover and found herself in a small clearing, carved out of the forest and overlooking a deep ravine.

In the bright morning light, Clarke could see clear across the ravine to the other side, another craigy outcropping mirroring the one she stood on. The sound of the river rushing below echoed against the rock walls, and sent goosepimples skittering up Clarke's arms. It seemed different in the daytime, sure - the opposite cliff had been invisible through the nighttime fog, and the crashing of the waves had been drowned out by her own shouting, but to Clarke, it was unmistakable.

This was where Charlotte had jumped.

It was like a dream - Clarke drifted to the edge, staring down at the splashing rapids that looked miles below her, imagining that she could feel the cool bite of the water against her cheeks even from this distance. The breeze from earlier had picked up to a gentle wind that buffeted her back and forth, and she wondered if places had memory. Did these rocks remember what happened here? Could she hear her own anguish echoing back against the ravine walls after all this time, if only she knew how to listen? So rapt in her own wondering grief, Clarke was caught completely off guard when a large hand closed around her elbow. Instinct took over and she'd lifted knife from her belt and pressed against the neck of her attacker before she'd even turned fully around.

"Not thinking of going for a swim, are you Princess?" Bellamy's question was presented casually, with all the lilt of his everyday sneer, but the hardness of his eyes told a different story: the significance of where they were was not lost on him. He stayed frozen, holding her arm firmly, until Clarke hissed out a shaky breath and lowered her weapon from where she'd tucked it just under his jaw. Bellamy stepped back, pulling her with him until they were a comfortable distance away from the edge of the cliff.

"You startled me." Clarke said in lieu of an apology - Bellamy nodded, apparently understanding her intention, and shrugged a bit.

"I called out when I first saw you, but you didn't hear me," he explained, "and then I didn't want to make you slip." Clarke nodded, reality seeping back into her and forcing her to reckon with what had just happened. The cliff. Charlotte. Bellamy's arrival. The knife. Clarke's gaze flickered to where she'd been pressing moments before - a bead of red was growing under the sharp edge of his jaw. Bellamy noticed where she was looking and lifted a hand to investigate, his finger coming away bloodied.

"I didn't realize it was you." Clarke noted by way of an excuse, a defensive edge wrapping around her voice, prepared for her partner to turn sour. Instead, a guttural sound erupted from him, low and halting - was he chuckling at her?

"Don't be sorry—"

"I didn't say I was."

"—at least now I know you can defend yourself." Bellamy smirked at her, and Clarke felt hot color rush to her ears.

"Of course I can defend myself, Bellamy, I wouldn't be out here on my own if I couldn't. I know the rules." Clarke snapped. She wasn't feeling hostile towards her dark-haired companion specifically, but their current environment had her on edge. Bellamy chuckled again, seemingly unaffected by her lashing out at him, although Clarke noted the steel in his eyes had not faded: an odd contrast to how amicable he seemed otherwise.

"Well, now I have proof." Bellamy announced, a statement laced into his tone that prevented Clarke from arguing the point further. He darted his finger forward, and for a ridiculous moment, Clarke thought he might mean to smudge his bloody fingertip against her nose. _Gross._ Although it seemed unlikely, she was unwilling to take the chance, and swatted his hand out of its trajectory towards her face.

"Cut it out." She growled, the razor edges never leaving her voice. Bellamy seemed to sober up then, the gravity of their Earth-bound existence catching up with him, and he stepped away from her, dropping to sit a few feet away from the edge of the cliff, his gaze cast to the other side. Clarke joined him after a moment of hesitation, struck by how similar this arrangement was to their rendezvous outside the dropship the night before. "Is Jeremy okay?" Bellamy nodded. Clarke let a short breath escape her lungs, and took a moment to appreciate the wave of relief that had washed over her. "Thanks for making me go to bed last night." She addressed the air in front of her after a moment, a peace offering of sorts.

"No one can make you do anything, Princess." Bellamy scoffed, and Clarke let the edges of her lips curl upward at the second back-handed compliment he'd tossed her way in the last twelve hours. "What are you doing out here, on your own?" It was a true question, Clarke noted, as opposed to the bald faced accusations he usually dealt out. She was oddly thankful that Bellamy had snuck up on her - she suspected that her successfully pulling a knife on him was all that was saving her the 'don't leave camp without a gunner' speech.

"I was running." She answered. Bellamy's head snapped to face her, brows drawn sharply together.

"From what?" He demanded, and Clarke noted his eyes slowly sweeping her up and down, presumably taking inventory of any injuries he may have missed on his arrival. His gaze sharpened on her forehead, and if the heat dripping down her brows was any indication, her bruise was starting to color.

"I wasn't running from anything." Clarke shrugged. As Bellamy's mouth puckered in a delightfully blank look of confusion, Clarke laughed a little, shaking her head. "I was just... Running. To run." Bellamy harrumphed thoughtfully at that, his gaze finally returning to the ravine. "I've been doing it for about a week. It makes me feel... Stronger. Like I'm less of a liability when I leave camp. Like I'm at the mercy of every remotely threatening thing I... bump into out here." Clarke couldn't help but answer the questions he hadn't asked, as he had the night before. It was what they did - anticipate.

"What did you bump into?" There was a laugh tucked in Bellamy's question, and Clarke knew he was asking about her developing pair of handsome shiners, her choice of words having assured him they weren't caused by any immediate danger.

"A giant herd of Grounders. Had to be a hundred of them, at least." Clarke answered immediately, and Bellamy's tucked laughter became an outright bark, thoroughly amused.

"Give 'em hell, Speedy." He agreed, shaking his head. Clarke snorted. From the nature of Bellamy's latest monicer for her, she suspected her running would resurface in a later conversation. He wasn't one to let things go so easily. A moment of comfortable silence stretched between them, during which Clarke noted that her heart rate had mostly settled from her jog. Probably for the best. She hadn't really considered the very real possibility that she'd given herself a concussion. Has she blacked out? She remembered _seeing_ black... Was that the same thing? She should tell Bellamy. Anticipate.

"It was a branch." Clarke offered.

"Was that the first time you heard one of kids call you Mom?" Bellamy answered.

Oh.

Clarke floundered for a moment, caught truly off guard. Bellamy shifted to face her, arm looped lazily over his bent knee, his body's relaxation still dissonant against the hardness that'd fallen over his expression. It wasn't unforgiving, or off-putting. It was... Intense. Insistent. Clarke suddenly recalled an Earth Skills class during which they'd study how cobras would hypnotize their prey with their eyes. Unable to break eye contact, Clarke ran her teeth along the inside of her lip, praying that words would find their way to her.

"Yes." She confessed finally, any idea of a witty retort dissipated under the scrutiny of her partner's stare. Something in his choice of words was giving her pause, and she frowned. "Have you–"

"Heard them call you that before? Yeah." He met her truth with one of his own, and Clarke felt the vice grip from the night before closing around her heart once more.

"What?" She whispered, not trusting her full voice to maintain whatever dignity she had left. This was far from where she'd anticipated her morning run going.

"Usually after you leave the dropship, or after you've made some kind of announcement." Bellamy hesitated, his gaze flickering away from hers at last to track a bird that swooped low over the ravine. "It's usually endearment. Sometimes it's frustration."

"So he wasn't mistaking me for his mother." Clarke realized aloud, unsure whether this revelation was a relief or an even greater grief.

"No. That's what the younger kids call you." Bellamy's gaze had softened, the last of his confession having found its way to the light - Clarke attributed the steel that remained in his eyes to their surroundings. Another long silence stretched between them, and Clarke felt the sun beat down on the back of her neck. It was getting later in the morning.

"Why are you here, Bellamy?" Clarke asked, not bothering to hide the gentleness that colored her question. She had no doubt he understood her meaning - this was far out of the way of camp, and he couldn't have left much after sunrise to get here at the same time as she had. This was no casual stroll, and he had no spear to hunt. Bellamy had sought this place out.

"I come here to remember." He murmured, his eyes following the hawk that now pursued the smaller bird they'd noted earlier. Clarke waited - anticipated. He continued. "I tried going to the graves. Didn't work. Damn things don't even have anything written on them, just mounds of dirt and bones. This is where she is." Clarke's mouth had opened a bit, and she sucked in a breath at the rawness of Bellamy's words. There was no guard here, the steel she'd seen thus far that morning replaced by a burning that engulfed his eyes and cheeks alike.

"Bellamy—" Clarke began, but she knew even as she spoke that she'd never finish her sentence.

"Jeremy's last name is Palmer." The fire and vulerability had evaporated into the wind and the rough Bellamy that Clarke recognized - but perhaps not the one she preferred - had reappeared. "Be back at camp within the hour or your runs are through." With that, he was gone. Clarke sighed, resting her head in her hands.

Neither of them had known Charlotte's last name.


	4. Little Fox

4.

The afternoon was in full swing at the dropship camp as Clarke returned, and the bustle of activity was a far cry from the peace of the forest - although no less comforting. She wasn't sure which settled her more, and that thought in itself spread a warmth through her bones and hid a small smile on her lips. This was home now; not just the camp, but the forest. The Earth. Stepping through the gate, she nodded at the guard, a red-headed boy named Lyle.

"How're things?" Clarke asked, and earned a bit of an odd smile in response. Strained? Was he feeling okay? His complexion was no paler than normal - his light freckles having defiantly refused to darken under the fall's insistent sunlight.

"Holding together all right. Miller had a right fright this morning with both you and Bellamy out of camp, though." Lyle offered. A frown creased Clarke's brow, and she hissed at the pain it sent zipping across her forehead - the bruise. That explains the look she'd gotten, at least. "Where d'ya sneak off to so early, any way, little Fox? I didn't notice you were out of the gate until I saw the back of your head disappear into the trees. Made me feel pretty shit as a guard, y'know." Little fox? Clarke wrinkled her nose a bit, enjoying the mental image of a fox kit bounding around the clearing. There was a fox near the camp that the guards liked to keep tabs on. It usually crept about around dusk.

"What did he need?" Clarke asked, noting the flash of disappointment that flickered across the guard's face as she glazed over his question. She'd assumed it to be rhetorical, and found herself a little out of her element now that it seemed that it'd been legitimate. Thoughts warred within her, her survivalism growling warnings at her optimism. Did he truly care where she'd been? Bellamy had mentioned that perhaps she'd garnered some degree of endearment in the camp. But with knowledge came power, and Clarke was hesitant to offer the intimacies of her whereabouts without due cause...

"You'd probably have to ask him." Lyle's brusk response ended Clarke's internal debate, and she glanced into camp. Miller stood by the base of the dropship, talking to Bellamy, whose arms were crossed over his chest in a position that promised nothing good. Glancing back at the Lyle, Clarke found herself struck by how much she needed to look up at him to make contact. Had he grown in the weeks since they'd been there?

"Thanks for letting me know." Clarke said, trying to lace as much sincerity into her words as she could manage. If there was a stirring in the camp in her favor, she didn't want to squash it. She turned to walk through the gate, and found herself conflicted: it felt clinical to ignore Lyle's question, as though she were manipulating him, using him for support. It felt dishonest. If they trusted her, should she not return their efforts with all she could? Leaders must be vulnerable. Otherwise, they are tyrants. Right?

"I need to close the gate, Clarke..." Lyle mumbled, the reservation in his tone making her choice for her.

"I was out running," Clarke answered, turning to face him fully and registering the surprise in his face, "I've been going out most mornings. Helps keep me calm." Lyle seemed to absorb this for a moment, before a broad smile spread across his freckle-dusted cheeks.

"Still gotta close the gate." He said, reaching out to gently guide her inside. Clarke jumped a little as his long fingers curled around her shoulder, and her stomach flipped - it sent jitters through her system, not unlike the sensation of stepping into the lake without being able to see the bottom. Not a pleasant feeling... But not wholly revolting, either. Clarke took a deep breath, and smiled, stepping in time with Lyle and murmuring a quick '_thank you_' before making her way to the dropship. Baby steps.

"Clarke. Glad you're here." Miller was the first to acknowledge her arrival at the ship, and Clarke nodded at him, glancing at a bandage on his calf, stark against his darker skin where he'd rolled up his pant leg. "It's nothing, got some poison oak I don't want to risk spreading." He answered her questioning gaze, and Clarke chuckled. The honor of their first poison oak encounter had gone to Monty, after he had particularly bad luck trying to find a new spot for their latrine. It was the hardest most of the hundred had laughed since landing, which hadn't helped the poor boy's discomfort one bit.

"You were looking for me?" She asked, glancing to where Bellamy stood, arms still firmly folded. The muscles of his forearm was dancing as he clenched and unclenched rhythmically, a sure sign he was stressed. Their gazes crossed as he swept his steely focus to Miller, and Clarke could almost hear him instruct his second to disclose whatever they'd been discussing. There were days when Clarke wondered if Bellamy wasn't really some kind of psychic, given the ease with which he seemed to communicate with eyes and frowns alone.

"It's about the traps we've been finding outside camp." Miller began, the hesitance in his tone sending tremors down Clarke's spine.

"Traps? You've found more?" She interrupted, earning a glare from Bellamy and a nervous gulp from Miller. Nervous? He was never nervous. Apprehensive, maybe, but Miller's nerves were firmly in his control. What was going on?

"Yes, but it's not the number. It's the traps themselves." Miller hesitated a moment more, before bracing himself and schooling an expression of nonchalance on his face. Clarke was suddenly aware of the aura of concern that must have surrounded the three highest-ranking of the hundred, and forced her own shoulders to relax. Miller was right. No need to cause panic about the camp without good reason. "They weren't set by Grounders." Annnnd there was the good reason.

"What?!" Clarke hissed, her eyes flying wide. Bellamy clasped a firm hand around her shoulder, squeezing hard and forcing her to fold back away from Miller. "One of the hundred?" She asked, holding her voice as even as she could manage. She must have done alright, because Bellamy's vice grip disappeared.

"I don't think so." As if on cue, Miller flickered his gaze once more to Bellamy. Clarke waited patiently, having accepted days ago that when in Bellamy's presence, Miller occupied a firmly beta position: he wouldn't share without his alpha's express say-so. "I think it's someone else for the Ark." Now it was Clarke's turn to cast a questioning gaze towards Bellamy, who dropped his chin in as close to a nod as he could manage without attracting too much attention.

"The mechanics are perfect, but the construction is shoddy." Bellamy explained. Clarke picked up where he'd left off, forming her own understanding even as she spoke.

"Which you're interpreting to mean somebody who is well-studied, but is unfamiliar with materials on Earth." She concluded. Miller nodded grimly. "Why can't it be one of us?"

"The poison oak." Bellamy began, and Clarke frowned. He continued, an odd purse to his lip. Clarke glanced over her shoulder to see the guards looking their way, Lyle's forehead creased. She forced an easy smile on her face, and batted at Miller's upper arm. He flinched away, but barked a laugh back nonetheless. Keeping up appearances and all that.

"What about it?" Clarke pressed.

"It was holding part of the trap together," Miller explained, "And those traps were definitely not there a week ago." This time, Clarke's laugh was almost genuine.

"And no one of the hundred would be stupid enough to use poison oak after Monty's experience two weeks ago." Clarke filled in the blanks, and both boys nodded grimly at her. "Smart, Miller. What's the plan?"

"We're leaving one active, as if we forgot about it, and we're going to stake it out." Bellamy answered this time, drawing his shoulders up as he slid easily into authority-mode.

"That'll give us the who, but I'd really like the why." Clarke mused. Bellamy's hands resumed their roost on her shoulders and steered her up the ramp.

"Patience, Princess," He instructed, propelling her through the parachute as Miller took his silent dismissal and headed back into camp, "For now, you have a patient to check on." Once inside the dropship, Clarke blinked a few times as her eyes adjusted, spotting Jeremy sitting up on his cot.

"Clarke!" He helped, leaping his his feet and bounding towards her. In instants, he had both Clarke's and Bellamy's hands on him, forcibly holding him as still as they could manage. "I'm feeling WAY better! I am almost totally sure I wasn't poisoned with Grounder juice although I guess it could also be that I'm immune, which would be pretty cool, and I would definitely let you test out my blood if I am immune—"

"OKAY." Bellamy barked loudly, effectively silencing the younger boy as the same look of reverence Clarke had noted the night before occupied his features.

"Sorry Bellamy." Jeremy mourned quietly, drawing a chuckle from Clarke as she squeezed the smaller boy's uninjured shoulder.

"Grumpy here just doesn't like loud noises in the morning." Clarke teased, earning a scowl from Grumpy himself, and a soft smile from Jeremy, who for his part seemed hesitant to laugh at something the alpha male hadn't expressly declared funny.

"_Grumpy_ wants a word with the Princess, Jer. Mind running out and getting more water?" The smaller boy was gone even as Bellamy finished, and Clarke marveled again the power of her partner's influence. She watched him watch Jeremy leave, and felt her earlier smirk soften into a genuine smile as she recalled his declaration of Jeremy's heroics the night before. He knew his way around his kids, whether he liked it or not, and Clarke was once again grateful to have him at her side.

His stare turned then on her, and her smile fled. The gentleness of his gaze after Jeremy had given way to the rawness she remembered from that morning at the cliff, when he'd bared his persisting guilt at Charlotte's death. For an irrational moment, she wondered if he remembered - it had felt so much like a different reality than this, the firm and unforgiving metal of the dropship - but of course he did. Bellamy didn't forget.

"What do you need to talk about?" She wondered, surprising herself with he softness around her question. His walls didn't rebuild, as she had assumed they would, and she recalled then the night that Dax had followed them to the bunker. That was the Bellamy here with her now, the pain and worry flush on his face.

"Jeremy wasn't supposed to be on that mission." Bellamy answered grimly. Clarke realized the significance of this information even as Bellamy began to continue, and she cut him off.

"You were." He nodded. Clarke swallowed hard, panic setting into her heart. Could the traps be targeting Bellamy?

—–—

**A cliffhanger! Things are going to start to pick up now. Guesses? I'm hoping to incorporate a bad guy I haven't seen a lot of...! Hints! **


	5. Holmes

The silence that stretched between Clarke and Bellamy seemed to swell and twist into something almost solid, pouring into Clarke's lungs as she sucked a steadying breath in, and settling in the bottom of her chest. It left no room for air, and indeed collapsed in on itself, creating a vacuum where there should have been strength. The frown that crease Bellamy's forehead had answered her question.

The traps were targeting Bellamy.

Clarke gasped for air then, only realizing when the edges of her vision began to darken that she'd been holding her breath. No. She had to be rational. Leaders make choices based on what they thought was right, not on panic.

"Princess?" Bellamy's prompting murmur snapped Clarke back to the present, and she forced her gaze to meet his. She found her shock reflected there, and remembered that he'd pulled her in here, alone. Away from Miller, his second. Fresh, unencumbered air filled Clarke's lungs at last as she forced her heart rate to settle. Calm down. Anticipate.

He had pulled her aside. He wasn't informing her of any new information, not really. Then, if he wasn't telling her... he was asking her. Sharing with her the reality of their situation, and sharing with her the responsibility of deciding how to move forward. Clarke took another breath. Anticipate.

"We don't know for sure they're targeting you." Clarke began, and felt her cheeks flush with gratification at the relief that washed over Bellamy's taut features immediately. He had kept to the same conclusion she had, and it clearly had thrown him for a loop.

Bellamy wasn't one to care for himself, not now that he'd found one hundred younger kids who he deemed considerably more worthy of his attention. The idea that he had brought danger to the camp must have ripped at him from the inside out from the moment Miller had shared his theory.

"We have to address all possibilities." Bellamy retorted, the fight in his tone another wash of comfort that settled Clarke's hammering heart. She nodded, her hand floating to hover over the handle of her knife.

"We should brief everyone." She offered, earning a sharp shake of Bellamy's head.

"Not until we know who we can trust." Bellamy growled. Clarke frowned, trying to follow her partner's reasoning.

"Miller said it wasn't one of us?" Clarke clarified, although in not arguing, she'd already agreed to Bellamy's objection. His intimate understanding of the mob mentality was something Clarke had come to respect almost holistically.

"Just because one of the hundred didn't set the trap, doesn't mean none of us are involved." Bellamy's expression was stormy, and Clarke felt a rumble of apprehension in her stomach. He'd figured something else out - he wasn't just addressing a vague possibility, he had already decided.

"What do you know?" Clarke murmured, after her partner had glowered silently for a few moments. His gaze snapped to her then, apparently waking from his musing.

"Miller showed me the other traps. They run our hunting tracks. No one from the Ark could watch us that closely without being seen." He thundered quietly, his body held dangerously still by taut muscles.

"So whoever it is has help from inside camp." Clarke hissed, her voice dropping off suddenly as Jeremy re-entered the dropship, two large canteens of water in tow.

"I got two just in case! Are you thirsty, Clarke?" The younger boy bounded over to Bellamy and Clarke, who had drawn closer together during their hushed debrief, and were now practically huddled over the exam table. Clarke stepped away from Bellamy, intent on giving him time to even his breathing before interacting with Jeremy, and offered him a grateful smile.

"Yes. Thank you." She spoke as warmly as she could manage, relaxing a bit as she felt Bellamy step up behind her. His hand ghosted up to rest on her shoulder, a gesture she didn't quite understand until she noticed Jeremy's eyes had widened.

"Anything else you wanted to say?" Bellamy's rumble carried more of a melody than it had moments ago, a lilt that Clarke had come to recognize as his way of being gentle. She stifled a laugh, absurd given the circumstance but unavoidable as she watched Jeremy's head bob up and down so quickly she worried he'd given himself whiplash.

"Thank you very much Clarke for saving my life and being so nice all the time." Jeremy gasped out, earning a warm smile from Clarke and a satisfied nod from Bellamy as he headed for the door.

"That's more like it. Princess, don't you have work to do?" Bellamy barked as he disappeared outside, a glance cast over his shoulder at the last moment assuring Clarke that their conversation was far from over. For now, she occupied herself with checking Jeremy's stitches and listening to him ramble about his memories of the panther.

The sun was dipping behind the canopy surrounding camp by the time Clarke neared an appropriate break point in her seemingly endless list of tasks. Small fires had sprung up like weeds around the camp, and members of the hundred were huddled around them in arrangements that were borne more out of habit than any particular sense of division, in the traditional sense.

Hunting parties collapsed at the same fire pit to enjoy the fruits of their labor, younger kids moved as a small bumbling herd; the partisan politics of the Ark stations had dissipated, leaving only a shared drive to survive. Sure, the hundred were volatile and quick to mob, but they were also fiercely loyal. They were tied together, a community linked by chains that had only grown stronger since their arrival on Earth.

One particular chain was tugging at Clarke's mind, and her gaze flickered from fire to fire, seeking out the partner she hadn't seen since that morning in the drop ship. Miller had mentioned in passing that Bellamy had gone hunting that afternoon, and Clarke had been stewing ever since. Bellamy's second-in-command didn't mince words, and he never made small-talk, so his seemingly casual note on Bellamy's absence had sparked a worry in Clarke's stomach that she was sure the other boy shared.

After a few moments of looking, during which Clarke's mind warred with itself regarding whether this was truly a valuable use of her time and debating the merits of the concept of worry in and of itself, she finally spotted him: Bellamy hovered near the gate, apparently discussing that night's watch with the newly rotated shift of guards.

As if the wind had whispered her thoughts in his ear from a hundred feet away, Bellamy's head snapped up and his gaze latched on to hers. Clarke felt her face harden, an instinct - show no weakness, show no worry. Not to him, not to anyone. The deepening crease in Bellamy's forehead hinted that her reflex had not come quickly enough - he grunted the end of his orders over his shoulder and stalked towards her.

Fight or flight. Clarke's feet were already moving towards the dropship as her mind turned to a one-track triage of what she needed to discuss with him. Bellamy's hand closed around her arm, turning her around, and Clarke met his gaze as fiercely as she could manage. This was routine - she had been seeking him out, but he could never know that. Let him believe their discussion was his idea, gift him the illusion of control, and perhaps delay the inevitable disagreement.

"My ears were ringing, Princess." Bellamy voice was grinding and low, and Clarke rolled her eyes immediately, twisting her arm out of his grip.

"Probably a side-effect of that big head of yours." Clarke shot back, earning an amused quirk of Bellamy's lip. Formalities out of the way, she got down to business, turning now to face him fully and crossing her arms over her chest. "I heard you went hunting today."

"The boar on that spit agrees with you." Bellamy nodded towards the large fire roaring by the smokehouse, and frowned at his smaller companion. "You're the only one who doesn't seem thrilled with me." There was a taunt tucked in his words, a dancing tease that slithered past Clarke's defenses and appealed to her more childish side.

Clarke huffed a little, Bellamy's challenge prompting her to forego the filter that she felt necessary as a leader, and eliciting a more immediate, thoughtless response. Her words poured on to him in one breath, "You shouldn't be leaving camp when somebody's trying to have you killed," and she was as stunned as he was when their meaning registered.

"Excuse me?" Bellamy's words rumbled like a fast-approaching thundercloud, and Clarke found herself racing to backpedal, mentally testing out any scenario that might assuage the fury that had suddenly found a home in Bellamy's already dark eyes.

"You heard me." Traitorous tongue! Clarke cursed herself, but committed - it was too late to turn back now. "Until we know what's going on, you should be more careful." Something Clarke didn't immediately recognize registered on Bellamy's face, and she cursed quietly when she realized it was tenderness - the fight had fled from her voice, and her last words had come out soft and worried. She hadn't meant to betray her fear to him, and yet with Bellamy, it always seemed to worm its way out.

"I am careful." Bellamy's answer was gruff and blunt, but the tenderness in his eyes remained, dousing the fury it had replaced. This Bellamy, this walking juxtaposition, somehow made far more sense than its angry counterpart, and Clarke felt her shoulders droop from the defensive positions she'd barely realized they'd taken up.

"You're reckless." She chided, earning a scoff and a pointed glare at her raccoon-ing bruise. Clarke scoffed right back at him, and turned once more to return to the dropship. The argument was over - it had played out perfectly by the book, which was comforting in itself. If she couldn't protect her partner, at least she could still predict how he would react.

"Hey." Scratch that. Clarke turned at Bellamy's errant exclamation, fingers tingling as her nerves danced. He'd gone off script - what was there left to say? A flash of confusion across Bellamy's face matched her own. His filter was down. This never turned out well.

"Bellamy?" Clarke prompted after a moment of silence, and his face cleared.

"Don't go Sherlock Holmes-ing around, ok? You should be careful too." It wasn't an order, but a suggestion. An acknowledgment of his feelings, his worry, and an assurance that they were on the same page. Clarke felt her lips curl skywards in a small smile, and she held his gaze for a moment more before disappearing towards the dropship.

It may have been off their beaten track, but his suggestion felt as inevitable as his taunts. It followed with the Bellamy she'd encountered at the cliff, and the Bellamy that had taken care of Jeremy. The winds were changing in the dropship camp, and despite the new dangers they brought, Clarke couldn't help but wonder at them.


	6. Uh

**Ok I know I'm switching perspective here, let me know if it's jarring. I wanted to play in Bellamy's mind for a while, and it worked better to start with him given how I want this chapter to go. **

•••

The mid-morning sun shone on the camp, dancing shadows lending a sense of play to the everyday chore the hundred were occupying themselves with. Laughter echoed against the metallic walls of the dropship. Guards sparred with leafy branches, though their tendency to whack over stab hinted that there was little mind being paid to the possibility of a real fight.

The last of breakfasts disappeared, the first of lunches took form. Fires were stoked, and embers caught in the wind. A good mood seemed to prevail in all except Bellamy Blake and those unfortunate souls caught in his orbit.

Bellamy was pacing up and down the ramp of the dropship, his mouth curled into a sour scowl. Miller hovered at the top of the ramp, one arm holding the other tenderly to his chest, his hand clamped over a bloody rag that he'd spun around his forearm.

"It's just a scratch, Bellamy." Miller cast out with the hopes of placating the older boy, but he was met with a withering glare.

"For now. Isn't the Princess always the one going on about infection?" Bellamy snarled, not missing a beat in his pacing. Every pass he made took him further down the ramp, inch by inch working his way through camp. His thoughts were already well clear of the gates, racing through the woods.

"I cleaned it already. I just don't know where the sutures are." Miller took a hesitant few steps closer, entering the threshold of the track Bellamy was digging into the ramp with his impatient feet. Mistake.

Bellamy was in his space in a flash, his mouth a harsh line cut through his freckles. Miller managed not to flinch away, barely, and steeled himself. "And you don't _have _to know where the sutures are. You know why you don't?" Bellamy's hands flew wide to his sides, brows arching up as he invited the answer to his demand. Miller hissed out a short sigh.

"Because I'm not the medic." He answered, lifting his fingers off the bandage in as close as he could manage to a 'surrender' gesture.

"You're damn right you're not." Bellamy resumed his pacing after his last growl, and Miller began to move towards the door to the dropship, clearly understanding that the conversation was over. He was better served stitching up his wound than feeding the anxiety of his leader.

Bellamy noted the retreat and clenched his fists in an alternating pattern, working his way through the alphabet in Morse Code to occupy his mind. By some miracle, the older boy's anxious energy had gone unnoticed by the camp at large, but it wouldn't last.

He stalked to the gate, watching with a grim satisfaction as Roma and Sterling snapped to attention at the sight of him. His guards were, at least, more in tune with his personal stormcloud than the rest of the delinquents. Comforting to know they hadn't faded into complete incompetence.

"Who's out of camp?" Bellamy demanded, keeping his gaze fixed on the reappropriated tree trunk holding their twin gates closed to the outside world. Roma spoke for both guards, although Bellamy could practically hear the nervous glance exchanged between the two.

"Um, a hunting party went out this morning. Derek, Lyle, Monroe, and Harper. Monty and Jasper are doing plant stuff, I think. And, uh..." Roma hesitated, and Bellamy felt his worry collide with his anger in his chest at such a high speed that both splintered, furious anxiety setting his nervous system aflame.

"Is that 'uh' supposed to be the Princess?" Bellamy asked, the bass tones of his question leaving no doubt that this was the point of his being there in the first place. This time, Sterling was the one to fill the void.

"She left at first light. Didn't say where she was going but uh, it was Clarke, so—"

"So obviously she can do whatever the hell she'd like?" Bellamy was practically spitting venom, and both guards had the sense to stare at the ground between their feet and let their leader blow his anger out at the gate.

Damn Princess traipsing around like she owned the whole damn forest, out for hours with no note, no word, not even a damn smoke signal. Bellamy was a flurry of energy and frustration as he swept around camp, double-checking his hunting knife on his hip and swinging a gun over his shoulder. Taking out his anger on a dried sliver of meat, he bellowed a few curt words to Miller, who nodded grimly from the door of the dropship.

Bellamy's tantrum came to a rest at the gate once more, where Roma and Sterling were wondering quietly how they'd gotten so unlucky.

"Nobody else leaves," Bellamy growled, "now open the damn gate."

•••

Clarke was doomed.

In all honesty, it wasn't until about twenty minutes into her run that her conversation with Bellamy the night before even wormed its way to the front of Clarke's mind. Her body had operated on auto-pilot when she'd woken up that morning, dressing and heading out of camp with nothing but her knife and canteen, everything according to the routine she'd been following for the previous week.

Perhaps another symptom of constant adrenaline overload? The pruning of any unnecessary thoughts and the refocus of bodily functions on what was immediately needed? An intriguing line of thought, but... No. Clarke grimaced. Her forehead throbbing was the first memory from the day before that had demanded her attention, which reminded her to assign her primary focus to what was in front of her. No more branches to the face.

The memory of her tumble had snapped her synapses into action, though, and steps later she was seeing Bellamy's tender eyes etched into the tree trunks that blurred past as she ran.

'_Don't go Sherlock Holmes-ing._'

Well, she hadn't. Not really. She was just running... But she knew that he had meant to echo her request of him, that being 'not to leave camp while they were perhaps being hunted by a hereto yet unnamed threat.'

Carrying on with her jog, consciously looping it around to bring her back to camp, Clarke grumbled to the greenery surrounding her. Bellamy and his damn tenderness-eyes. They were an unfair advantage, honestly. Clarke had never had to master the art of puppy dog eyes - she'd been a daddy's girl from the start, and her father could never deny her anything.

The Blakes had eyes down to a science. Octavia's eyes could end wars - or, as seemed more likely these days, start them. And Bellamy's...

Clarke hadn't begun to really muse on the infinity-pools of pain and tenderness and dissonance that were Bellamy Blake's eyes, because as she had rounded a large outcropping of rock, she'd tripped over something lanky and distinctly human lying in her path.

She cried out as she tumbled, large hands grabbing in an effort to catch her as the ground rushed up to meet her.

"Clarke!"

For the second time in two days, light danced in front of Clarke's eyes, and the nagging worry that she might be concussed slithered back into the depths of her mind, only to be banished by a more immediate realization.

"Lyle?" Clarke sat up, squinting at the pile of limbs she was tangled in. Long, muscled, and covered in rusty-colored freckles. Lyle.

He wore a sheepish grin, and one of his hands fled her shoulder to rub the back of his neck, as though his embarrassment manifested itself there as tiny pricking gnats. "I sort of neglected to keep my water intake in mind, and I might have fainted a little." He admitted, his cheeks lighting up to match his hair. Clarke frowned.

"But why—"

"Hunting party," Lyle cut in, "we were tracking a big buck and I told them to get it and then come back for me if I still wasn't feeling up to going back on my own. Lucky me, you found me first!" Clarity clearing the fuzziness out of her skull, Clarke nodded and smiled, sitting back to get a better look at the red-headed guard.

And here they were, three hours later. The hunting party hadn't returned, and all four attempts to head home had been quickly halted by Lyle stumbling, falling, or (at the lowest point of the morning) burying his face behind a rock to empty the few contents of his stomach.

Clarke was doomed. She was definitely not Sherlock Holmes-ing, but Bellamy had certainly noticed her absence by now, and three and a half hours was a long time to be out of camp.

"Lyle, I really hate to do this, but..." Clarke lowered a hand hesitantly on his shoulder, and was met with large baleful eyes cast up towards her.

"I know, Clarke, I'm really sorry. I think I'm feeling better now." Lyle dragged himself to his feet, making a big show of swaying and catching his balance once, and again, and again, until Clarke's whine of frustration brought him to stillness. "There. Steady as a rock. Lead the way, Little Fox."

•••

The sapling growing at the edge of the cliff clearing probably didn't deserve to carry the brunt of Bellamy's frustration. It was now bent at a distinctly unnatural angle, and it's untimely demise had not done a thing to remedy the fact that Bellamy had arrived here to find no Clarke.

He'd been so sure she'd be here, after their encounter the day before. Of course she'd gone on her stupid run, she never thought about herself - full of concern and chiding and scolding for him about leaving camp _with two other people _on a hunting trip, but not a thought given to leaving on her own not twelve hours later. And now, she wasn't here.

But perhaps she had been?

Bellamy's gaze zeroed in on a particularly non-Earthy looking item leaned up against a small rock in the center of the clearing. Closer investigation revealed it to be a heather gray strip of sweater, muddy and torn but unmistakably Ark-made... And unmistakably one of Clarke's arm warmers.

The indignant growl of recognition bubbling in Bellamy's throat caught and stuck there painfully as another, less immediately obvious feature of the garment drew his attention: a crust that was too light, too pungent, too not-quite-dried to be mud.

Blood.

Clarke's damn arm warmer was out of camp, no where near her, and _bloodied. _

Bellamy was seeing red, and it wasn't just the streaks on his fingers.

"PRINCESS." His bellow echoed off the opposite ravine wall, and set a flurry of birds fleeing the branches above him as Bellamy tried desperate to channel the dread pooling in his gut into a more productive form of energy: anger. The Princess had some explaining to do.

—-—–—

**so. This chapter is a little shorter but I really just wanted to get it out. Let me know what you thought! Another chapter is quick on its heels! **o.


	7. Motivation

**This picks up right where the last ended...!**

Injuries weren't easy to hide, not on Earth where a thousand obstacles sprang up every few steps that demanded the full attention of any who dared to explore her forests. Earth was an unforgiving host, a ruthless host that threw swinging branches and barbed leaves and sneaking roots at those who deigned to call her home.

All these little gifts from good Mother Earth had greeted Lyle less than warmly, causing him to shoot a hand out to keep his balance, and bringing Clarke's sharp gaze to the stained bandage peeking out from under his unrolled sleeve.

"What happened to your arm?"

It had been a casual question, a means of conversation to chase away the silence of the forest's shadows. Wounds were a dime a dozen these days, reliable as the sun's arrival each morning. They were not cause for alarm. Hesitance and furtive glances and a discreet gulp and exhale before answering, though... Those were cause for alarm.

Clarke was alarmed, watching Lyle's flickering eyes.

"I caught it on a big ole splinter on the gate log last night, after everyone had gone to bed." He supplied, flashing her a sheepish smile over his shoulder with a little shrug. 'Clumsy me,' he seemed to lament, 'silly clumsy Lyle.'

"Nice of you to deal with it." Clarke replied, an autopilot smile masking her racing mind. The stain on the bandage matched a small stain on Lyle's sleeve, as though it had soaked through to mar his shirt before finally clotting.

"Your sleep's worth a fair shout more than my chicken arms, I'd wager." Lyle chuckled with another little shrug. Clarke barely heard him, her mind time traveling to the day before, to their conversation at the gate. She'd noted his freckles, how tall he'd grown, how his pale skin seemed to defy the beating sun. The skin on his biceps.

Lyle had worn a t-shirt yesterday. Today, sleeves.

The injury must be from today, then? From this shirt? It could have easily happened when he'd fallen, hunters carried med kits now... But why lie?

Clarke's brow furrowed and her brain huffed in frustration, communicating its displeasure at this riddle by pounding on the inside of Clarke's skull. Her fingers found one temple and she rubbed out apologies, putting her paranoia to rest for a moment.

"I wish everyone was as thoughtful as you, Lyle." She mused, faking a yawn in an attempt to disguise her anxiety. The tall boy bobbed his head as he pushed a large branch aside, holding it to allow her to pass before following her own the path, reversing their previous walking positions.

•••

Princesses should stay in their castles. That was it. There was nothing else to it. It wasn't that he didn't think Clarke could take care of herself, but she had a nasty habit of getting herself into trouble. Someone was _hunting_ them for gods sake.

She didn't even know where the damn traps were, didn't know which were still active, and still she went dancing and prancing around without so much as a soul knowing where she was. It was enough to drive a guy bonkers. Bellamy felt a growl slip through his pursed lips at the thought. Stupid Clarke. Stupid reckless Princess.

_Snap._

Every muscle in Bellamy's body stiffened simultaneously as a branch somewhere to his left met an untimely end. Forcing his breathing to even, he released his knife from its sheath and turned to face the direction the interruption had come from, crouching into a ready position.

"Who's there?" He called out, flipping the knife in his palm a few times. Its weight was a familiar comfort, and he felt the apprehension that had pooled in his joints begin to dissipate. These were his woods. He'd faced the worst they had to offer. He was Bellamy fucking Blake. The woods should fear him.

A flicker of movement caught Bellamy's eye, and he squared his shoulders as the flicker formed into a shadow - a very human looking shadow.

•••

Clarke barely hid the sigh of relief that escaped her lips as the camp gate towered in front of her, easing open with creaks and groans that she knew as intimately as her own name. The bloodstain had left her uneasy for the remainder of their walk, and she'd taken to curt responses to Lyle's hopeful attempts at conversation.

Now, at the gate, the memory of their banter the day before floated in the air and teased her. 'How will they ever trust you,' it whispered, 'when you cannot trust them?' Dissonance pounded at Clarke's skull once more, the civil war of her loyalties tearing at her carefully held poker face.

She needed to trust her people, to be vulnerable and open... But that bloodstain _was_ from today, and Lyle had lied to her. How much faith could she afford? How much doubt should she benefit him with?

Clarke flickered her gaze through the opening gates at the widening view of camp, searching out her dark partner - he would know better. His instincts with the delinquents were spot on, and they held him in such great esteem. How to pick his brain without admitting defeat?

"Alright, Little Fox." Lyle's chirp snapped Clarke back to the gate, to him and to the present. She smiled at him, closed mouth and consciously crinkled eyes. Poker face. "I'm gonna change and rinse the mud outta this shirt. Thanks again for bumpin' into me!"

Clarke's gaze raked his shirt and confirmed that there was, indeed, mud caked on its hem. A heartbeat later, she admonished herself with a squeeze of her fists. Trust meant not verifying every story! (Caution meant double checking, though. Would Bellamy have checked? Her gaze flickered again.)

"Let me know if you need me to change the bandage on that." Clarke nodded kindly at the lanky boy's arm, and he shrugged, already on his way across camp. She shook her head as she too drifted closer to the dropship, hoping to clear her mind of the clouds that crowded it.

•••

"You're a difficult man to get alone, Bellamy Blake." A crooning, familiar voice slithered out of the darkness, and the apprehension Bellamy had so successfully banished just moments before flooded back, accompanied with shock, terror, revulsion... The gang was all there, congealing in his muscles and making his mind feel muddy and hot.

"You're dead." Bellamy spat out, unsure himself whether it was meant to be a question or a promise. Both, perhaps? The latter seemed like it would lead to a more restful sleep. Bellamy reared one arm up, preparing to chuck his hunting knife at the spectre, only to freeze as more slimy words found their way to the light.

"Do you think the blood will wash out of that scrap?" The voice was taunting, knowing, and threatening, dumping icy realization over Bellamy's quickly heating face.

"What the hell do you know." Bellamy snarled, losing the battle to keep his voice even. The shadow was circling now, forcing Bellamy to shift to avoid from displaying his back to the ghostly threat.

A chuckle echoed through the woods, cruel in its emptiness. "You were too clever for my traps," the voice teased, "and you are so rarely unguarded. I almost had you, yesterday morning, on your little walk in the park." The gears of Bellamy's mind were working in overtime, his breath coming in heavy puffs of frustration. "But suddenly, you weren't alone anymore." Clarke. "And that's when it all become so clear: you'd never give yourself up, unless you had the right... Motivation." _Clarke._

"Where is she." Bellamy knew his wild eyes betrayed him, he knew that he wore his desperation on his tight lips and flared nostrils, but he couldn't bring his face back into his control. Not when his worst nightmare was materializing before his eyes.

"Drop your weapon and follow me, and I'll show you."

Bellamy had no choice but to obey the shadow, the shadow he knew better than he cared to remember.

•••

Clarke's arrival at medbay brought with it a momentary reprieve. The familiarity of her territory, her home base, wrapped her like a sterile, metallic hug. She huffed out a short laugh - the earth air must truly be getting to her, for this place of blood and death to bring comfort.

Clarke paused, her fingers twitching over the herbs she was preparing to crush. Perhaps the air _was _getting to her? What had Earth Skills called them... Allergies? Food borne allergies had all but died away with the Ark's regulated menu, but air borne —

"Clarke?" A startled yelp drew her mind out of her sixth year classroom and back into the dropship, where Miller had just materialized in the door. He was gaping at her, and Clarke glanced down instinctively, wondering if she'd accidentally put on another bloodied jacket.

Finding nothing immediately wrong with her appearance, Clarke glanced back up to where the beanie-clad man had crept closer to her, his mouth closed and his eyes hardening. It was as though a polar vortex had found its way into their little medbay. The hair on Clarke's arms rose, and she hissed out a steadying breath. Miller looked as though he may vomit at any moment, although the steadiness of his feet preclude any chance that they'd just undercooked breakfast.

This was the side he shared with Bellamy exclusively, that he shared with Clarke only insofar as her being a surrogate leader in Bellamy's absence. This was Miller's fear - something that chilled Clarke to the bone. Wait. Clarke's gaze flickered for the third time since her arrival back, searching the shadows of the dropship.

It was a flicker reserved for a certain bull-headed partner, the rough and tumble to her soft and gentle, the 'rub some dirt in it' to her 'watch for infection.' It was a flicker that never failed, because oftentimes it crashed into Bellamy's sharp gaze seeking _her_ out. He left camp all the time, sure, but after their talk the night before...

Clarke shivered as the chill that had found its way down her back wrapped around her chest and nudged at her most private worries, whispering horrible revelations that eventually found their way manifested by her unfiltered voice:

"Where is Bellamy?"

She heard her own words as they echoed against Miller's stony presence, and marveled at how even they sounded. Her voice seemed disembodied, so mismatched from the sheer panic that was bubbling up from her feet to her widening eyes. That same sheer panic exploded into fireworks of No No No _No _as Miller answered her, his words seeming to slide through space like molasses, taking light years to travel the ten feet between them and another eon to register with her reluctant mind:

"He went to look for you."

—

**Cliffhangers cliffhangers cliffhangers sorry about it. Identity of mystery scary man will be revealed in the next chapter! Which hopefully will come quicker than this one did... Sorry friends. I'm not a quick writer. **

**Let me know what you think! Last minute guesses? **


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